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I'll send you to fight it out with the point of view police the next time it comes up.

Hmm. I begin to remember why Paul of Dune wasn't a great story. It's set a year after the events of Dune end and has a lot of potential. Unfortunately, the authors try to pull in material from the three House prequels, which I didn't enjoy. A lot of characters I didn't care for are reappearing, only older.

However, the story is much more understandable. The elder Herbert had a lot to say on ecology, religion, psychology, and politics, but I found some of it hard to interpret, even in my most recent reread. Paul of Dune is much clearer in that regard.

One scene in the latter where the authors missed the boat was when Emperor Paul Maud'dib addresses many great houses of the Landsraad on the old imperial home world of Kaitain.  The scene was way too short. That should have been a major chapter about Paul trying to win over the great houses to end his jihad as quickly as possible.

Ah, well. The sooner I get through it, the sooner I can start Dune Messiah and return to my half-confused state.

Yup. My thanks to all for an interesting discussion.

I fixed it by having the dark figure identify himself as the Antichrist, which I didn't do until yesterday. I went back and forth about whether to do that so early in the story, but it's no secret that the Church will come to believe they and Connor are being stalked by him (it's in the book summary). I figure get him in there right from the get-go.

Law & Order always throws out false leads. Ditto for Agatha Christie and Hercule Poirot. In your examples with Mary, the reader is owed an explanation at some point as to why the detective thought she was guilty. If Mary is completely innocent, I might word it differently, so the reader knows there is some doubt. I did that with the interrogation of Father Coppola. They discussed several times in the early chapters about needing more evidence. Even after they arrest him and he drops dead from a heart attack, Inspector Campagna is wondering if they just killed an innocent man.

My argument has more to do with the little assumptions one can sensibly make based on the POV character's knowledge. Romano knows Connor has special powers, and he's at the exorcism because he may have some insight into why they can't cast out the demons of the possessed woman. When he closes his eyes and turns his head from side to side, it's prefectly reasonable for Romano to assume Connor is sensing something related to the exorcism in progress. There's no reason for the as if. If Romano's assumption is wrong, it will have to be explained and maybe even foreshadowed.

By including as if and similar words whenever there is a reasonable assumption being made, it flags every one of them with an implied: Watch out! This may be wrong! As CJ noted, an author's attempt to make the MC completely objective when the story doesn't require it pulls me out of the story. The deeper the POV of the MC, the more those moments stand out when they shouldn't.

No, that's not what I meant, John. I'm objecting to having use words like: as if, apparently, obviously, most likely, etc. to avoid a pov slip when common sense says the pov character is making a reasonable assumption based on the information he has available. I follow the herd, but I do so unwillingly. I'm tempted to start breaking that rule in my next draft.

Turns out I already own Paul of Dune, which is the younger Herbert's immediate sequel to Dune. Do I read it next or jump to Dune Messiah as Frank Herbert intended?

Problem eliminated. I decided to have the dark figure reveal himself as the Antichrist right after he arrives. From then on Vitale only thinks of him as the Antichrist. I also added that Vitale thinks he knows him from somewhere, but can't figure out where because the Antichrist is hiding in shadows with fake eyes and a fake voice.

v7

I agree r.e. the many references to 'dark figure'. In one of my previous versions, the dark figure claimed he was the Antichrist right from the beginning of the chapter, so all of the references to dark figure were replaced with the Antichrist. It read much better. Unfortunately, the dark figure is not the Antichrist and his true identity won't be revealed until the end. As a result, if the dark figure goes around claiming to be the Antichrist when only his victims are listening, it will come across as a cheat later when he's revealed to be someone else. Why claim to be someone you're not if the only purpose is to trick the reader? The closest I could come to justifying his lies is that he likes theater and he doesn't want to be caught off guard. Even Vitale is skeptical in the latest version of this chapter. I'll take another look at him calling himself the Antichrist, but I think it's a stretch. I need the reader to know that his claims of being the Antichrist may not be true to avoid cheating at the end.

FYI, Connor is not the dark figure. That will be ruled out in my next chapter. The dark figure is 185 cm and Connor is 175 cm. I set that up in earlier chapters, but the Pope's Council will discuss it as they try to figure out who Connor really is.

I thougth of a way to do it. The cardinal thinks he recognizes the hooded being, but he's not sure from where. He never gets a chance to see him without his hood.

Thank you, all, for your feedback.
Dirk